Bittersweet Swordplay
by The Queen of Asgard
Summary: Hansel and Gretel had never heard of the League of Night before a witch hunter named Aurora literally runs into their newest target. Wary of a woman who is also the daughter of a warlock Lord, they trio must team up to try and stop the League of Night before they cast the world into an eternal twilight. Hansel/OFC
1. Moonlight

Overgrown vines cut the moon from my vision as I opened my eyes and winced as I felt something warm and wet touch my face, a strong grip at my breast, kneading it like dough. The warm, wet pair of lips moved from my bare shoulder to my lips. I gasped and felt the lips leave mine and fall backwards as I tumbled out of bed. The great pudgy man stumbled back as well, cowering at my form that was now sitting up.

"...The fuck do you think you're doing?!" I demanded as the man began to snivel.

"Please, I didn't think you were alive." He wept as I crinkled my nose in disgust.

"And you really think that makes it better?! What the hell?!" I snapped as I stood up and brushed off my dress, surprised to find that the once dark red fabric was now crumbling under my touch. "Where am I, anyway?"

"You...you are in the castle of Von Stratton, Lord of the North." The man tried to explain, trying to drop the fact that he had just been kissing what he thought to be a corpse, "Nobody's lived here for hundreds of years at least." He stood up and suddenly, a knife was out in his hand, "Now, why don't we forget that that happened and you can take your dress off? Nobody has to know."

I took a step back, my back hitting the stone dais that I had been laying on. No wonder I had just a bad backache. Wincing, I allowed my back to pop and then gritted my teeth, feeling a strange ebb of power coursing through my body, "Why don't you just back the fuck up and get out of my way you hormonal pig?"

"We could have done this the easy way." The man said grimly, "But I'm alright with screwing a beautiful corpse." With a yell, he charged at me with the knife, obviously trying to sink it into my belly. However, with a deft wave of my hand, the man went flying back as I ran at him, my own blades protruding from my dress's sleeves. With a roar, I jumped over his shaking form and nimbly brought my blades across his throat, splashing me with his own red, hot force. I took a step back as his body crumpled to the floor and his breaths became nothing more than geysers of blood as he attempted to take in his last breaths.

Finally, as I squatted down to watch him take his final gurgling breath, his eyes grew glassy and his heaving chest grew still. I slowly stood up and wiped the blood off my face with the back of my hand, holding the knives up to the light. What had come over me?!

I looked back towards the dais and saw a book on a table not too far away. Slowly, I walked over to it and picked it up, leaving bloody smears on the old, decaying pages. Shrugging I opened it and laid it out to see what it said on the inside.

"What the fuck?!" I swore angrily as I drove one of my daggers into the wood beside it, "The damned thing's blank!"

I picked it up to close it but in that fluid moment, something in dark purple script caught my attention. The part that was sitting in the moonlight held a single word that I could just barely see but could make out. The rest of the script was utterly unreadable, faded even in the moonlight.

_'Aurora...'_

I looked up at the sky and something stirred within me: perhaps a memory or a dream. This...this was my name and something else rang in my mind although it was just a word once again.

_'Witch...'_

Witch what?! Which way? Perhaps that's what the word meant as even 'witch' seemed to fade away from memory. Who was I?! Was I a witch? No...that was impossible...

I looked up and saw my face. I knew what witches looked like. They were ugly and horrifying looking with veins of darkness and eyes that could suck the very soul from your body. My eyes were light blue and my hair was so long it brushed the ground. It was stained with red from his blood but I could tell it was a dusty light brown color. I wasn't pretty but I wasn't witch ugly either. I was normal...ish looking enough.

"What am I?" I whispered, flipping through the book. Alas, none of the other pages held any sort of information. Frowning, I closed the book and looked around the room for any sort of notion to where I was. The fat man I had killed said it was Von Stratton's castle...whoever that was. I looked out the crumbling wall and saw that I was sitting on top of a great mountain, trees growing all around me. "How did I end up here?"

Frowning, I looked around the room until I found a simple black shirt and a pair of pants that seemed to be in a fairly usable condition. Donning them, I then wiped off one of my blades with the rags that were once my dress before running the now clean knife under my hair. Rat's nests and tangles fell from my locks as I brushed the rest of my uneven haircut back into a low ponytail and secured it with a strip of cloth. The boots I had been wearing had held up quite a bit better and so, nodding at my reflection in the tarnished mirror, I searched for a door to release me from the prison I had been held in. Stepping over the slumped corpse, I managed to find an old wooden door that had been destroyed as he tried to get in.

Following the ivy covered steps, I found myself at an entryway vast and dark. At the end was a stained glass mural above a set of what might have been rich thrones once upon a time. Taking a step forward, I narrowed my eyes in hopes I could see what this stained glass window could tell me.

There was a woman with hair as radiant as the sun, drawing back an arrow in a silver bow. The man, looking dashing even in his colorful form, held a sword up as an army of witches and warlocks rushed them. I pressed one hand against the window and felt warmth rushing into my veins. Were these my parents?

_"Look down...look down..."_

I looked around to see who...or what had spoken but saw no one. However, I did follow the advice and indeed looked down to see a trapdoor, perfectly hidden against the dark stone floor of the room. With shaking hands, I slowly opened the door and saw a set of rotten stairs leading down into darkness.

"Oh jeez..." I mumbled before a torch on the right side of the stairwell burst into flame and allowed me to see, "Well, that's not suspicious at all!"

Hesitantly, I took the torch and feebly touched my first foot to the wooden board. The stair creaked in protest but seemed to hold my weight. Slowly, I put my other foot on it and...

CRASH!

I went falling into the darkness, the wind knocked out of me as the torch, miraculously still burning, lit up the strangest assortment of things I had ever seen. Chests and troves of gold glittered everywhere as my heart began pounding in my chest. How had nobody ever found this before?!

I ran over to a chest and pulled it open, surprised to find it laden with gold and weapons, including the same silver bow that the woman in the window had carried. Picking it up, I felt it hum and suddenly, it began to fold up and change. I dropped it as it grew hot and turned into something that looked like a cross between a crossbow and sword.

"What in the world..." I began to say as a note that looked as ancient as the castle, fluttered to the ground. Slowly, I picked it up and and opened it.

_'My dear Aurora,_  
_I apologize for what we have done to you. I wish I could say more but the League of Night is trying to burn our castle as we speak. We will trying and keep you safe as long as possible. If you are reading this, it means that we have suceeded but we are dead. 200 years can be a long while, don't you think? _  
_Anyway, everything in the room rightfully belongs to you. We have placed an enchantment on it to make sure if anyone wandered down here it would be empty. Please be safe with our equipment, darling. _  
_We love you very much and trust you will do the right thing. _  
_With love, _  
_Count Reynolds Von Stratton and Lady Evelyn'_

"Witch hunters," I breathed as the note crumbled to dust in my hands, "But how do I get out?"

A gentle breeze echoed through the darkness as I looked around for some explanation. Picking up the crossbow, I slung it across my back and looked for the exit,"Where is that coming from?!"

Suddenly, the torch went out and I was left alone in the darkness...or what I thought was darkness. At the far end of the room, I saw a dim grey light that obviously led somewhere and so, following the light and bashing my calves more than once, I made my way to...wherever I was going.

Finally, I saw the moonlight peeking in through a hole in what appeared to be curtain of ivy. Brushing past this, I winced as the moonlight struck my face. The whole landscape was awash in an unearthly glow as the sounds of night met my ears. Could I possibly be 200 years old?! How come I couldn't remember anything?!

Looking up at the moon, I narrowed my eyes, "I blame you for this."

The whinny of a horse caught my attention as I glanced around a pillar to see a speckled horse flicking his tail, giving me an 'are you coming' sort of look. Laughing in spite of myself, I raced towards the beautiful stallion and untied him. As I did this, he began to nicker and whine more, knowing I was not his true owner.

"Hey now, relax," I found myself whispering to keep my new steed calm, "You've got me now."

With this, the horse seemed to accept he was now my mount and so with that, I climbed onto his back, clicked my tongue and raced off into the night.

* * *

**I. Love. Jeremy. Renner. There, I said it. And I also found this movie to be rather amusing with witch hunters and wondered if there might be some other witch hunters skulking around this universe...Well, then there's Aurora. Now, I'm still deciding whether or not this is going to be a story I'm going to use but...we'll see. **


	2. Jezebel's Terror

-6 Years Later-

"Hansel, will you quit fucking around?" A tall, slender brunette woman called to her older brother as he squatted down and checked out a puddle of slime that was sitting at the base of a tree, "We need to find Jezebel before she freezes that kid."

The two infamous witch hunters, Hansel and Gretel had developed quite a reputation, even more so since they defeated Muriel and her band of goons, their services were even more needed. Of course, that also sent them up into the darker reaches of the continent where sometimes, eternal night coated the land...like, for instance, the eastern reaches of the world where the pines grew so big one would have to strain their head to even look at it.

"I'm not fucking around. I'm getting...evidence." He explained, still looking down at the blue colored slime, "It might already be too late for the kid."

Gretel scoffed and tossed her crossbow over one shoulder, "Come on, Hansel. It won't be if we stop looking at puddles of God only knows what every 5 seconds."

Her brother stood up and dusted off his trousers, making sure his own rudimentary shotgun was in place. He was handsome with brown hair that was slightly spiked in the front, with a sharp, angular face and dark brown eyes that were narrowed in suspicion.

"I don't know what you're waiting for, Sister Dear." He said, smirking as she scoffed and the two continued through the woods. Night had begun to fall and both knew it was a dangerous time to be out in the woods but...They knew it would be their only chance to catch Jezebel.

The air around them grew colder as they walked, snow beginning to cover the ground as they trekked up the side of a mountain, the last know hiding place of the notorious old hag that had been plaguing the villages around the area for a very long time. The witch known only as Jezebel had been stealing children away and using their essence to in turn, create a winter that had lasted decades before Hansel and Gretel were called in. The people of the village were beside themselves as they managed to get out a few words that the two witch hunters would understand: mountain, witch, children, eternal.

The two slowly made the climb into the mountains, neither speaking in case they startled the witch. However, their breathing became more labored as they continued walking, stumbling over rocks and twigs in the ever growing darkness.

Suddenly, Hansel shot an arm out and Gretel ran right into it, "What is it?"

"I don't know but something feels wrong." He muttered as he slowly removed his shotgun and he held it up, "Come on, I have a feeling she's close."

The two continued up until their feet crunched beneath banks of ice and snow and the air grew chillier and the trees became thinner. There was no more dark earth under their feet as the steep incline of the mountain met them halfway like a silent adversary.

Finally, as they climbed they could see blood in the snow, dark stains of innocence lost to a darker foe that they would soon bring down. Snow began to fall and both were grateful for the warm clothes they had bought in the village, the shopkeeper's accent so thick and his words so muddled with his native tongue it was hard to understand anything at all.

They followed the blood trail for only a few yards until they saw something that chilled the two to the very bone. Someone was kneeling at the edge of an ice field, a child's body in their arms. The wind carried down an ancient language they could not understand but as Hansel finally raised his gun and fired, several things happened all at the same time.

The bullet came at the figure like a bat outta Hell and as it whizzed towards the figure, a hand shot up and the bullet pinged off of something that sounded metallic, the figure unharmed and still kneeling, the child in their arms.

Slowly, it put the child down and stood up, the cloak of the stranger flapping in the wind. It faced the two of them and saw that they both had their weapons pulled, ready to fire.

"I am not your enemy, Witch Hunters." The figure said, the voice distorted so neither could tell if it was a man or woman.

"Yeah, that's what they all say." Gretel responded before firing a round right into the figure. It seemed to stumbled back from the impact but both were surprised to see that the round had merely bounced off some invisible force and the bullet now lay on the ground, still smoking.

"I am not your enemy." It repeated, pointing up the mountain, "But I know that she is. I too hunt the one they call Jezebel."

Hansel watched the figure for a few more moments before it turned and began walking away, "What the hell did you do to the kid?" He demanded as it turned around once more and stood there, as frozen as the ice that surrounded them.

"I merely granted the child's soul passage into the next life, nothing more." It responded.

"So what, you're a priest?" Gretel question and both could almost feel the smile that pierced them behind the shadowy cloak.

"Not even close." With a wave of its hand, the snow thickened to where they could not see the figure any longer.

"Dammit! What if that was Jezebel?!" Gretel snapped as Hansel looked farther up the mountain.

"I don't think it was. She's known to attack on sight." Hansel mused as Gretel scoffed and slapped him in the shoulder.

"She could have just been toying with us! I mean, who's going to be up here on a mountain in the middle of the fucking night, finding kids to exorcise?" Gretel yelled over the storm as she scoffed, threw her crossbow over her shoulder and continued up the mountain. "Come on. Let's see if our crazy priest was right about this."

The two continued up the mountain until finally, they reached the first set of cliffs...one cave in particular quite interesting due to the fact that an unearthly glow filtered onto the freshly fallen snow, flickering off the flakes that still fell.

The two knew that they must tread lightly now. Weapons unsheathed, the duo padded across the snow, their footprints instantly covered. On the wind were strange incantations that neither would ever know...or choose to know. Hansel motioned for Gretel to take the left side of the cave as he took the right. Inside, they could hear a child crying and another begging for her life. In the strange tongue that the village spoke. With one terrifying, heart stopping scream, the child ceased to babble as a red light now spilled out onto the ice.

A woman laughed, dark and guttural as Hansel made sure that his weapon was loaded. However, as he did this, a single bullet fell out and landed on the snow. This was enough for the witch to know. A scream resounded across the open glaciers as she came barreling out of her cave, only to turn around and see Hansel and Gretel there, weapons poised at the ready.

"Say goodnight, Bitch." Gretel smirked as the witch gave another scream, this time so loud that the entire mountain seemed to shake under her very words.

The ground shook beneath their feet as they began to fire...rather off target. The witch seemed very unmoved by the earthquake as she brought up her hands and then sneered at the two witch hunters.

"You have brought this upon yourselves, Witch Hunters." She hissed in a thickly accented voice, "I am queen of this mountain and ruler of the snow." She snapped her hands towards Hansel and he was instantly knocked off his feet as the snow collapsed underneath him. With another yell, Jezebel allowed the wind to carry her up to the lip of the cave where Gretel was still standing, still trying to fire bullet. "You are not the first to be eaten by my mountain!" She yelled gleefully as the air crackled around her fingers and a dagger of ice was formed in her hands.

Gretel ducked as the blade whizzed over her head and she fired her gun into the witch's leg. She growled in pain but continued to fight, the two going at it like demons. Hansel sat up from where he had fallen and noticed, in horror, that ice was creeping up his legs, encasing him in a frozen casket.

"Sis...I don't mean to be a pain in the ass but hurry up and kill this bitch!" Hansel roared as two continued to fight, duking it out between flips and slashes. The witch cackled as Gretel felt something grab her leg. Glancing down, she realized that her ankle was caught in a brace of ice that kept her from moving. Jezebel moved forward, slower this time and slashed at Gretel. She managed to fend off several more of the assaults but suddenly found her gun on the ground, ice capturing her right arm from the cliffside.

The witch walked slowly now, almost toying with the pair, "And so ends the two great witch hunters Hansel and Gretel. Oh, don't worry. Your sacrifices will not be in vain. I'm getting revenge for my sisters in the East where you fought so valiantly against them...only to fall on a silent mountain..."

Gretel threw back her head and with a snort deep in her throat, hacked up a loogie and spat it at the witch, "Go to hell."

The woman wiped away the saliva from her face and then shot the witch hunter a nasty look, "Where do you think I am from, my dear?"

The ice blade was at Gretel's throat before she could speak another word, "Do you have anything else to say, Dearie?"

Gretel was frozen. Literally frozen to the spot where the blade touched her throat. She could feel the frostbite seeping up to her mind, numbing her and making her sleepy.

"I will make your death easy now. Sleep..." She began to say but at that moment, the blade fell away from Gretel's throat and everything came back into focus. She took a deep breath of frozen air and she watched as the witch was cut in half, black blood staining the snow, a pair of blades protruding from her stomach. Instantly, the ice was melted and Gretel had her gun pointed at the person who had killed Jezebel. In surprise, she saw the dark figure that had been on the mountain with the child not twenty minutes before.

"Thank you for keeping her distracted." The voice said but this time, it was distinctly female, "I couldn't have killed her without your help."

"Who are you?!" Gretel demanded as the woman brought her hand up and pushed the blades back into her sleeves.

"Consider me a friend. We'll meet again very soon about some going on's in the world. Until we meet again, Gretel." The woman stuck her hand out and hesitantly, Gretel took it and shook it. With that, the woman turned and walked away towards the side of the cliff and down the mountain.

"Wait!" Gretel called, realizing that it was a thousand foot drop down to the ground on that side. However, without warning, the woman jumped and was gone. She raced over to the side to see if she had fallen to her death but could not see anything through the swirling fog down in the valley below. The snow had stopped falling and even now, she could hear the sound of dripping water. Winter was thawing.

Gretel slid down the side of the cliff to where Hansel lay on his side, the covering his chest, "You didn't stop him?" Hansel demanded as Gretel broke the ice and helped her brother up.

"She was a friend." Gretel said as they walked back up to the cave and saw several children in icy cages, the bars already starting to thaw. The instant started babbling and crying when they saw Hansel and Gretel and several of them broke through their cages with relative ease, tears rushing down their faces.

"Come on, we need to get them out of here." Hansel said sharply as Gretel looked around the hideout. It was rather standard, shelves of ingredients surrounded a cauldron while a blood spattered stone lay in the center of the room. However, there was something in the very back of the cave that caught Gretel's attention. Leaning down, she pawed through a trunk of what appeared to be Jezebel's belongings.

"Hansel," She called as her brother poked his head back into the cave, "What's the League of Night?"

"No idea." He said simply before walking into the cave, "Why do you ask?"

She opened her palm and he saw a gold coin with the words "League of Night" engraved on the gold surface. Turning it over, he saw a woman's face on it...Jezebel's that was now fading into the gold. "What the hell...?!"

Gretel tucked the coin into her pocket and then stood up, stretching, "Well, I guess that's another mystery that we have to solve."

"Another mystery for another time," Hansel agreed before the two exited the cave and herded the children back down the mountain.

* * *

**So, for the time being, I wanted to continue this. Not sure where it will go but I think it's going to go somewhere AWESOOOOOME. At least, I hope it will...Thanks to everyone who added this stories to favorites or is watching it! Also, thanks to the reviews I got on it! You guys flatter me! **

**Until next time, my friends! **

**Queenie**


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